I am an adoption law paralegal working in the Naples, Fla.,
area. I have been working in the legal field since 1983 as a legal
assistant. I began my career working with an attorney in family law
and criminal defense. I was introduced to adoption law in the early
1990s by assisting the attorney with uncontested stepparent and
grandparent adoptions.

I received my paralegal certificate of
completion from FloridaInternationalUniversity
in 1986, my Certified Legal Assistant designation in 1987 from the
National Asso­ciation of Legal Assistants, and my Certified Florida
Legal Assistant designation with a concentration in family law in
1988 from what was then Florida Legal Assistants, Inc. I received an
Associate of Arts degree in criminology from
EdisonCommunity College in 1996, and a Bachelor of Science
in criminal justice from
FloridaGulfCoastUniversity in 2006. I
currently am an associate member of the Collier County Bar
Association and the Florida Adoption Council. There are five
attorneys and four paralegals at the firm.

What are your responsibilities?

One of my daily responsibilities is legal research,
which differs from other specialties because some adoption cases
involve researching and complying with your own state law as well as
another state’s law. For example, if a prospective adoptive parent
who resides in Florida calls and wants to adopt a baby being born in
another state, it’s my job to analyze and report to my supervising
attorney where the termination of parental rights will occur (which
state has the most favorable laws, time frame and costs). Next, I
determine where finalization will occur (i.e., whether the sending
state allows out-of-state residents to finalize), and what the legal
requirements are for the family regarding the interstate compact,
including whether an attorney can be the receiving entity or whether
it has to be an adoption agency. Then, I research how the consent
for adoption should be drafted. Finally, I determine and draft the
required court pleadings for my supervising attorney to review and
sign, including affidavits, petitions for adoptions, petitions to
terminate parental rights, pending adoptions and final judgments. In
contested cases, I review the case notes and file to draft the
Request for Admissions, Request for Production and Interrogatories.

How did you get into this specialty?

My husband and I adopted three children, and my
legal background gave me insight to the many aspects of adoption
law. When it came time for me to work part time, I decided I wanted
to use my legal background for the good of adoption. I was hired by
the attorney who handled our third adoption. After she closed her
practice, I was hired by Jeanne T. Tate, an AmericanAcademy of Adoption attorney.

What are some challenges in this field?

In adoption law, the most challenging aspect of
working with families is the anxiety and other emotions involved
with wondering whether the adoption will fall through. Another
challenge is deadlines that are equivalent to a “race to the
court­house” since petitions often need to be filed the same day
they are signed.

Adoption laws change regularly, and keeping up
with the changes also can be a challenge. For example, one of the
biggest changes in adoption law right now has to do with
international adoption after The Hague. In an effort to
better protect the well-being of children available for adoption
internationally, more than 60 countries worldwide are adopting The
Hague Convention on Intercountry Adoption, including the United States, where it’s
anticipated to take effect in March 2008. Any adoption from a Hague
participating country will have to be processed through a Hague
accredited adoption agency. The accreditation process under The Hague is lengthy and helps ensure that the
agency is operating under a series of best practices designed to
protect the children and the adoptive families. By having an
up-to-date knowledge of The Hague, I am able to
better assist my law firm and the agencies we represent.

What is your most memorable case?

My most memorable case was a maternal grandparent
adoption. The birth mother was 100 percent sure she was going to
place the child until she was asked to sign the consent for
adoption. The birth mother was crying and shaking and saying she
just wanted to try to parent her child. I said, “Then go home and
try, we’re here if you need us.” After six months, she came in, said
she tried, and signed the consent for adoption. It then took me
about two years to secure the birth father’s signature on the
consent for adoption because he always was out of the country. I
kept in contact with him from country to country via the Internet,
telephone and regular mail and finally got him to sign the documents
in England.
It took a lot of patience and perseverance but this case taught me
how to serve documents in different countries. The greatest joy of
my job is making families’ dreams come true.